Letter to the Journal and Courier

29 November 2011

Dear Journal and Courier,

Purdue University currently maintains academic exchanges with National Cheng Kung University in Tainan, Taiwan, despite its documented dismal human rights record and discriminatory policies against American ("foreign") professors.

While teaching there, I was illegally dismissed. When I appealed, my dismissal was canceled, but this was a delay tactic, perhaps in hopes my visa would expire and I would be forced to leave the country. For the university refused to reinstate me. So I appealed again.

Now the university argued "foreign" teachers were not protected by the Teachers Law, which insures contractual renewal for teachers. When I won an appeal at the Ministry of Education the university argued "foreigners" had no right to appeal, though the university held appeal hearings and participated at the MOE appeal! So it defied the MOE ruling for nearly two and a half years, despite ten warning letters from the MOE (attached).

In the meantime it contested the ruling in court and repeated its discriminatory claim that "foreigners" were not protected by Taiwan's Teachers Law, a claim rejected by the court and the MOE (attached). Even after it was forced to honor that ruling it held bogus "hearings" and imposed penalties against me, reversed by the MOE.

Despite official rulings and letters (attached), the university, on its official web page, currently whitewashes my illegal dismissal as "discontinued employment" and claims "legal procedures were carefully observed." This was signed by current NCKU president, Hwung-Hweng Hwung (attached). This whitewash clearly contradicts the MOE Appeal Ruling (attached): "[T]he Appeals Committee’s decision violated the law and was wrong" (trans.).

Nor is this an issue of one rogue university president. The case involves several NCKU presidents, all of whom ignored the rights of an American professor, including Cheng-I Weng, Kao Chiang, and Michael Ming-Chiao Lai. Though many NCKU faculty were accredited by US universities and guaranteed equal protection under the law while matriculated in the US, and despite my repeated appeals for their assistance, they have not petitioned on my behalf.

I don't see how, under the circumstances, Purdue University can, or should, maintain academic exchanges with NCKU. Apart from my case, a university that brazenly defies laws and published rulings, and a faculty silent about such misconduct, has undermined its academic status, guaranteed only through adequate institutional oversight, which, as the MOE ruling states, was clearly lacking in the handling of my case: "It should specifically be pointed out that regarding the protection of the teacher’s legal rights in this dismissal case, the handling of this case by the university’s three-level Review Committees and Appeals Committee makes it hard to conclude it was without flaws" (trans; attached).

I've contacted the president of Purdue University, France A. Córdova; Purdue's Board of Regents; and the Indiana State Board of Education about this issue, to no avail. Instead, despite strongly documented attachments, I received a single response from a Purdue official:

7/25/09
Dear Professor Canio,
Thank you for your email.
Although I empathize with you, this institution is not in the position to comment on your statements.
Sincerely,
[Name redacted]

As we have seen in the recent cases of Penn State and Syracuse University, the priority of academic institutions seems to be to protect its own interests first, regardless of human rights issues involved.

Sincerely,

Richard de Canio
Tainan, Taiwan